BLACK MARKET

Performance of exchange, Zaz Festival, Tel-Aviv December 2016

Exchanging currency of labour into money into soil into time into information, the performance stretches the concept of trading and puts into question the material and method of trade in the Big Data age.
It takes place in the Central Station of Tel Aviv. A place that was built to serve as the central traffic hub of Israel and as a central trading centre, with seven floors and about  230,000 m2 of shops. Today most of the space is empty and abandoned, but still serves as a fluid crossing point of highly diverse social groups including “locals” — people who found a home in the station.
Black market happens on a square of soil installed in the open market area on the 4th floor. On this square of soil there is a table and two chairs. On the table there’s a scale and payment envelopes with the following information written on: name, amount of working hours, multiplied by hourly rate and the total sum of money earned for the day. Also on the table are a funnel and an audio recorder.
Participants that decide to sit are offered a trade and choose an envelope. The total sum of the day’s earning written on the chosen envelope is translated into grams. Using the scales, that number of grams of soil is taken from the square. The soil is poured through a strainer into the envelope using the funnel. The time it takes for the soil to pass into the envelope is the time the participant is invited to share information. The information is recorded on the audio recorder. When the whole earth has passed the funnel, the recording is stopped, the envelope is sealed, and it is handed to the participant. A trade has taken place: information exchanged for a piece of land.